Ji Yoon Yang Continues the Evolution of Alternative Space LOOP as its Director

Seoul’s art community is known for its alternative art spaces. Alternative Space LOOP is one such place, known as the first nonprofit art space in Korea. LOOP opened in 1999 with a mission to connect art and culture with the public. An open call for artists takes place annually, addressing contemporary issues like climate change and social issues. Its community, now supported by board members and an active group of members, is artist-driven, creating projects that cross cultures and borders and exist outside of a typical white cube space.

Its current director, Ji Yoon Yang, began as a curator at LOOP in 2006. She has held positions at Corner Art Space, Sound Effects Seoul, and Space Hamilton. She spoke with Whitewall about how keeping LOOP alternative requires a constant need to evolve, as the space approaches 25 years in action.

WHITEWALL: How would you describe your role as the director at LOOP?

JI YOON YANG: I started my position in the fall of 2017. My work has been about how to reshape experimental art institutions in the area of climate change. That’s been the main focus. The pandemic happened, we had to close down, but then we had to research what was going on. I’m curious to experiment with how to go beyond the limitation of what you see in galleries in the urban context, and how to create certain types of community.

WW: That’s part of LOOP’s mission, engaging with the public. 

JYY: LOOP is the first nonprofit art space in Korea. We see many cases where alternative spaces become more like institutions—otherwise they disappear from history. I really see art institutions as living organisms. You have to constantly renew yourself. When LOOP started, it was an alternative to what was conventional contemporary art in 1999—mainly paintings and sculptures. But by 2008, with the financial crisis, LOOP really had to reshape everything just to survive, which wasn’t easy. 

In 2019, when we were celebrating the 20th anniversary, we changed our formula as a nonprofit art organization with our board members and other members sponsoring us on a monthly basis. It’s more stable and more of a middle-sized art organization that has more of a public sector in it than how it began. 

“I really see art institutions as living organisms. You have to constantly renew yourself,”

Ji Yoon Yang

Building Global Communities with Collaborative Projects

WW: In terms of the board members and then the members that you have, could anyone be a member and contribute monthly, or do you have a community of donors? 

JYY: Usually board members are more active in the cultural scenes of Korea, but anyone can be a member. 

WW: That really builds a community.

JYY: Exactly. We have more responsibility towards the community as well. I feel more obliged to serve newer ideas. 

WW: That is an interesting thing you pointed out, when you’re an alternative space, but you’ve been around for 20 years, what does that mean? Because it’s no longer new.

JYY: Exactly. You really have to reshape every moment of your practice. But that’s actually fun.

WW: In terms of the artists you serve, too, is it still typically emerging artists as the focus? 

JYY: It’s half and half. We have an open call every year for emerging artists and also emerging independent curators. Each year we get more than 150 applications. We select one or two projects based on each year’s theme we want to focus on. It’s very competitive. But that’s the window that we open, I believe that’s very democratic how they can apply. 

We build international communities around the globe to share. We focus on ecology, or ecofeminism, and we question the issues of art capitalism at the same time. We want to share our interests, and we found there are so many curators or institutions who have been developing this topic. It’s really interesting to compare the geopolitical differences. That’s why we constantly want to meet to do collaborative projects. 

“We focus on ecology, or ecofeminism, and we question the issues of art capitalism at the same time,”

Ji Yoon Yang

Going Beyond the White Cube Space with an Artist-Driven Approach

WW: Reaching the public of Seoul, too, are there new ways that you think about bringing them in? 

JYY: I curated “Refugia.” I invited 11 international women artists to broadcast their sound art pieces for Seoul Traffic Broadcasting, the traffic radio. I really hoped for the general public to experience this unfamiliarity of experimental audio culture in daily life. Because it’s traffic radio. You play for taxis and buses. It’s live-streaming all day. Most of the artists, I realized, were talking a lot about ecology and climate change through their works in it. It was a very experimental sound for Seoul Traffic Broadcasting. I was surprised to read so many positive comments from people. I realized people are much more open to new culture than those inside the art world think or assume. It was actually quite fun to see that. We try to go beyond the white cube space and try new approaches for people to experience. 

WW: How do you work to maintain LOOP’s artist-driven approach? 

JYY: When we select artists from the open call, it’s not just giving them the empty gallery to do whatever they want; it’s more about producing the whole project based on the research we do together. Last year we did the solo show with Yo-E Ryou, whose research is based on hydro-feminism, and she’s learning about the Haenyeo culture in Jeju, which is traditional women divers, a tradition from five hundred years ago, traditional women divers. She talked about the water and the woman’s body and connecting with each other for centuries.

At the same time, last year, we co-curated a project called “Sisters We Grow,” which was an exchange program between LOOP and the San Francisco Art Commission. The Bay Area also has really big Asian American communities. We found out that there is a lot of research, because there’s also the seaside, on eco-feminism, hydro-feminism, and new approaches to agriculture. We made our first show with them and LOOP, and they traveled to San Francisco with the same artist but slightly different versions of the works which were curated by Jackie Im, the curator based in San Francisco. 

It’s a constant comparison of what is really happening around the world, and then connecting dots around the world to create this kind of art community to talk about climate change and the role of contemporary art in that context. It’s very local. 

WW: And global at the same time. 

JYY: It’s climate change we’re talking about. And all the issues are so different, the social issues, political issues, or historical issues, so we really look to figure it out together. 

We also found out there are so many women artists who didn’t get the right exposure for their important research on ecology, and we are always doing talks, workshops, and lectures on forgotten female figures. 

Not just of art history, but botanical history. All these stories are so male-oriented, but there have been so many women researchers who were their wives and their daughters. 

It’s very patriarchal, capitalism is supporting this mainstream culture, and that’s been creating all this exploitation of humans and natural resources. Eventually, it leads to what we are facing now. 

Embracing the Intersections of Diverse Artists

WW: Are you always kind of thinking, what are we showing in Seoul and how can we connect elsewhere? 

JYY: Definitely. One of the current exhibitions and shows is called “Hexed, Vexed, and Sexed.” We invited eight women artists from Korea to present their pieces in West Den Haag in the Netherlands. The space used to be the former American embassy, so it’s quiet. You have the whole contemporary, modern history between America and Korea, and how women’s approaches intersect. We invited artists from the 1960s till now, so you can see the generational changes throughout the works. It’s really for the audience in Holland, in Western Europe.

I really believe there should be more nonwhite, female, or queer artist shows in Western art history and the mainstream. We were aware who the audience would be, and we sharpened our position to present the works. We included Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, who was very active in the seventies in New York and San Francisco, but who had a very sad, tragic death. I really believe that incident shouldn’t have happened—it’s really a systematic racism or misogyny against Asian women that led to her death. Starting from her work, and then to younger Korean female painters, you see different approaches, different environments, or different societies that have changed in the last 50 to 60 years.

“I really believe there should be more nonwhite, female, or queer artist shows in Western art history and the mainstream,”

Ji Yoon Yang

WW: Given the community of LOOP, do the artists that you’ve worked with in the past become like Loop alums, the community of artists? 

JYY: Yes, I love to work with the artists I have worked with before, and from that we develop something together. It’s not just after one show it’s done, I constantly invite them for other projects.